>From: "scerir@libero.it"<scerir@libero.it>
>Reply-To: extropians@extropy.com>To: extropians@extropy.com>Subject: Re: Didn't need no welfare state
>Date: Mon, 24 Apr 2000 13:25:39 +0200
>
>We hope that (working) immigrants can sustain (by means of
>taxation) our welfare state. Otherwise our welfare state will crash
>very soon.
>scerir@libero.it>
>Hooray! Let it crash, Italy doesn´t need to import slaves.
>Waldemar Ingdahl
>
>I agree, partially.
>In my modest opinion <slaves> is too much expressive. They
>come spontaneously (and, frequently, illegally) from very poor
>countries. But, that’s true, our politicians (from left-side to
>right-side) look at those immigrants just as <servants>.
>Now our welfare state is based on the one to one ratio. One
>worker maintains, supports one retired. This system is crashing,
>because of lifetime extension. Soon this ratio will be one to two, or
>one to three.
>Sincerely,
>scerir@libero.it

Once upon a time, I was an active member of the old PRI (The Italian
Republican Party- NOT similar to the American Republicans). I left them
since they couldn't comprehend that the terms in Italy were rapidly
changing, among other things due to immigration. So what if they come from
poor countries? There are a lot of works to be done in Italy, especially in
the service sector. But, as elsewhere in Europe, the enormous power of the
unions has effectively closed the borders for legal immigration. Even the
internal market for labour in the EU doesn't work. One of the few cases
where it works is for soccer players (but the previous government thought of
stopping even that). It is not only the fact that Italy's population is
getting older that is a problem (as elsewhere in industrialized countries)
but of a very rigid labour market.